An Inspirational + Lifestyle Blog

It’s a fact that the majority of Americans suffer from some sort of debt. It’s no secret that debt is a stressful factor in so many lives. Whether it’s in a mortgage, car loan, credit cards or student loans. It can still cause stress in our lives.

According to NerdWallet, the average household with debt has about $15, 355 in credit card debt and about $129,579 in total. That sounds like a lot! But, remember that some of us have mortgages, car loans and student loans. These are probably some of the more common ones that do dig a pretty good size hole in our lives. I have come to realize that I will always have a mortgage payment and will always have a car payment. My student loans, well that’s a different story. I’ve been trying to pay them off since 2004 and I feel like I’ve made no leeway. A part of me feels like those aren’t going anywhere either.

Today, I’m introducing you to someone I find to be very inspirational. She’s one of the main reasons that pushed me into starting this blog. Michelle Schroeder-Gardner, writer at Making Sense of Cents, is famous for how she paid off $38,000 in student loan debt in just seven months. She also quit her day job to run her blog full-time and made around $350,000 in 2015. Yeah, I admire her!

I recently read her article on “Things You May Feel When Paying Off Debt.” She says you may feel tired. You may have to make sacrifices. You might be bored. And, you might feel like you need to keep up with the Joneses.

I just recently returned from a 3-month training for work. Luckily, we’re blessed to have my husband as a stay-at-home daddy so the entire family joined me. Because of this, though, we had to rent an apartment.

After researching all the apartments in the area, I found one – just one – that allowed short-term leases of 3 months. Perfect! We immediately booked a 3 bedroom and my kids each had their own room. But, now we’re in an empty apartment. What next?

There are places where you can rent furniture on a month-to-month basis. There are two I was able to easily find: Rent-A-Center and Cort Furniture. Cort Furniture will even deliver and they have military discounts! However, we did not choose this path.

It turned out to be more affordable to purchase cheap furniture and only the bare minimums that we needed. We did this in hopes to sell the furniture before we left. When you rent from Cort, they include the whole package – all furniture pieces, kitchen essentials, the works. This is great if you want an easy way to furnish your temporary living space. But, it may not be more frugal.

Today, I’m going to show you exactly what we bought and decided were essentials for temporary living spaces. I’ll also leave my personal review on each item to let you know if it was worth the purchase or not.

Plus, there’s a FREE guide available for download near the end! You won’t want to miss it.

The following is a sponsored post with my comments added. All images are from Stocksnap.io.

Ideally, having a good budget allows you to balance savings and spending. Not only do you need money for your everyday and monthly purchases, but also for long-term hopes and dreams which includes a plan for setting aside money. For some, it’s simply a matter of discipline, stashing a portion of each paycheck for a rainy day. But under other circumstances, frugal solutions are required to lower the cost of living and carve out some savings.

If your nest egg isn’t growing as fast as you would like, or if you have a big-ticket item on the horizon, it pays to tighten-up your household budget, in the interest of creating a contingency fund.

Don’t Underestimate the Value of Saving

Although each family has its own set of goals and values, those who regularly put money aside share countless reasons for saving it up. In fact, you don’t really need a specific reason to create a cushion – it just makes sense to have some flexibility and security within your budget. If a clear purpose makes it easier for you to save money, use these inspirations to keep you on the path to savings.

Hello, Lovelies! I'm proud to say that I'm a follower of Christ, a mother of two and an always improving wife to the most wonderful stay-at-home daddy. I struggle on a regular basis to find the positives that are sometimes masked by negatives. Join my journey as I learn to find the inspiration in this crazy thing called life.

Hello everyone! I'm a stay at home mom to two sets of twins, and even though everyone says to enjoy it when they're young, I go back on forth on wishing they would get older and longing for them to be babies again. Sometimes I need to slow down and just enjoy the moment. Thanks for joining me on this journey, and I look forward to sharing my outlook and excerpts on life with 4 under 5.